NEW HAVEN-Artist Fritz Horstman, with his completed installation in Beinecke Plaza. Horstman is working with the Peabody Museum. Melanie Stengel/Register

NEW HAVEN -- On Earth Day, a river ran through Beinecke Plaza.

It was the Quinnipiac River, actually, courtesy of hundreds of plastic water bottles, a Bethany artist and a large cistern of water.

"It's a call to attention," said Fritz Horstman, who created the 100-foot long public sculpture throughout the day. "I'm not against plastic water bottles. We need them. But we should also understand the water cycle, since we have a river about 10 blocks from here."

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The idea was to build a geographically accurate replica of the Quinnipiac from its headwaters to the point where it empties into Long Island Sound. Organizers said they wanted to emphasize our proximity to water resources and their importance in our lives. They also sought to highlight the need for recycling the ever-present plastic products in our lives.

"People are amazed that 1,500 plastic water bottles per second are being produced," said Jim Sirch, education coordinator for the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History, which organized the event with help from the Yale office of sustainability.

By noontime, there were several hundred bottles in place. Horstman estimated it would take about 2,000 to complete the sculpture.

"We started up in New Britain. Right now we're about to exit Meriden," Horstman said, following the trail of bottles along the granite walkway. Horstman teaches drawing at Albertus Magnus College in New Haven and is the artist in residency at the Josef and Anni Albers Foundation.

The curving, meandering path of the river was outlined on the plaza with blue tape. Visitors were asked to fill empty bottles with water from a cistern and place them at the end of the line.

"It's pretty cool," said Steve Sgambati of Branford, a contractor working on a nearby building who came over to investigate all the plastic bottles on the courtyard. "It reminds you that most of the bottled water you get is basically tap water anyway."

His co-worker, Sean Jarry of Burlington, Conn., also filled a bottle. "People will take notice of this," Jarry said.

Horstman and the staff at the Peabody had been collecting empty water bottles for months in advance of Earth Day for the project. Upon completion, all of the bottles will be recycled by students in the Peabody's Evolutions after school program.

As for the water in them, Evolutions students will be watering vegetation around campus and downtown with it.

Susan Butts, of the Peabody's sustainability committee, said organizers originally planned to build most of the sculpture with water bottles people already had with them as they walked through the plaza. But it seemed many people with water were carrying reusable containers.